Steele Johnson wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 13:25:
I'd hate to be the guy that convinced the board of directors that a current gen Star Wars themed mmo is going to make us billions of dollars because the genre is booming and there are no signs of subscription-based mmos dying anytime soon. What a bunch of dumbasses. Do they even play games?

It's EA. They really have no fucking clue, and no, nobody in EA plays games. Despite articles saying that some of their head honchos play EVE... *gigglesnorts*.

Creston

After finishing all of that crap in abt 1 month and, very surprisingly, after I played GW2 till I get level 53 and being bored as hell, I restarted playing Star Trek Online and I have fun now . Even that is much better than SWTOR

NegaDeath wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 18:11:
Time to reboot SW Galaxies. Give it an engine and visual update, fix some of the NGE lunacy, and done.

I played SWG for a while, and now that it's dead and gone . . .
I am convinced people are looking back on that game with rose tinted glasses.
When it first came out, I remember hate for the way the game and gameplay was set up and all the bugs. I remember how it seemed that players were disappearing right up until NGE.
When they did NGE, I remember the hate for the changes and suddenly the original game then oh so great all of a sudden.
I remember logging in in the months before it shut down and running into maybe 10 players. Total, not a day.

JohnBirshire wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 11:52:
I might still be playing this if they did this 5 months ago. Too little too late.

For what it's worth, will be playing Guild Wars 2 until Planetside 2 comes out.

I cannot get enough of GW2.. and I also played the PS2 beta.. a good bit. Having said that, I find that PS2 feels rather, blah. I LOVE FPS's and i LOVE large scale FPS's.. but there's something about PS2 that doesn't feel right, nor does the game give me a reason to jump back in the beta

I will also add that in TOR, around level 35 ish.. I started getting infuriated with the amount of identical quests, and identical gameplay. Also, the CONSTANT back and forth to my main quest hub and the long runs that took. Hit the max level and despite being a prior hardcore WoW raider and being in the same WoW guild that xferred to TOR.. I had NO desire to raid or run flashpoints.. nothing in the game gripped me or made me want to log in. I actually just stopped logging in one day.. just didnt care any longer.

Now after playing GW2 to 80.. and seeing everything this game has and does.. I couldn't ever play another game that's "less" of a game than this. GW2 has spoiled me rotten.

This comment was edited on Sep 20, 2012, 00:07.

Anyone else getting surveys from them? I think this is my fourth since they went retail. I only filled out the first. I spent hours detailing what I thought was wrong with the game and what was right back in the beta test that was more of a marketing test. They required you to fill out a survey ever time you played the game or face getting dropped from the beta. I filled one out daily for a couple weeks if I remember correctly before I grew tired of the game and their freaking surveys.

I knew it was a sinking ship before it left the dry-dock. To me its another of those MMOs that you couldn't pay me to go back to.

Agent.X7 wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 16:14:

Steele Johnson wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 13:25:

Not to mention the fact that most women hate Star Wars and sci-fi themed games.

Ignorant much?

Why, are you one of those female Star Wars fans who kind of looks like a guy with long hair? No, I included you in my calculation. I said "most" women.

Creston wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 11:35:
Everyone off the good ship TOR, because it's sinking fast!!

UO and DAoC are still going. There's a lot of milk still in that franchise. SWTOR will be around for a long time to come.

Leper wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 17:15:

I don't see why they are waiting so long to go fully F2P.

My understanding is that it's not as simple as flipping a switch. There are lots of changes needed to make the game to support the F2P model that can't happen over night.

Well of course it's not. Given their resources, it shouldn't take this long either. As I said, I fully expect there to be kinks to work out once it is applied as well. I just don't see how a project of this cost and of this size could not have had this as part of the plan all along...or at least part of the backup plan. If it did not that would only lend more credence to my assertion that the project management and planning has been atrocious.

Teams that are much smaller and with less resources have gone through this process, start to finish, in a much shorter period of time...and I suspect it is because they knew all along it was a possibility and made preparations ahead of time where needed. Considering every thread about this game on just about every gaming site on the planet, since it's announcement, has had at least one post that said something like "F2P in 6 months"...how on Earth would the developers themselves not have at least laid down the groundwork?

I would think the beta for it would at least be on the test server by now. Anybody know if it is?

This comment was edited on Sep 19, 2012, 19:11.

Time to reboot SW Galaxies. Give it an engine and visual update, fix some of the NGE lunacy, and done.

I'll never go back, even if it's F2P. It's a reskinned WoW clone, and nothing more. If I want to play that style of game again, I'll just go back to the real deal.

Another successful Bioware product! Good job.

I don't see why they are waiting so long to go fully F2P.

My understanding is that it's not as simple as flipping a switch. There are lots of changes needed to make the game to support the F2P model that can't happen over night.

MattyC wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 16:27:

Jivaro wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 16:02:
I don't see why they are waiting so long to go fully F2P.

DC Universe implemented F2P as soon as they realized a monthly sub wasn't going to work. The game still runs, and is even generating some money. I think it is because they didn't wait until everyone quit and the player base was so small that you couldn't make money off the in-game store.

Seems to me that Bioware/EA is counting on people to want to come back and give them a second chance....and with all the competition out there, I am not really sure that is going to work. Would have been smarter to go F2P while you still had most of the players' attention. Particularly given that the biggest complaints about the game revolve around endgame and PVP content...which are the only things to keep you playing after you complete a the story line. Even if people come back, how do you sell them anything in the in-game store if they leave again as soon as they wrap up their storyline?

I don't know, I am not a developer and I have zero experience in managing a project like that....but it just seems like one bonehead short-sighted decision after another.

They actually have a pretty reasonable number of high pop servers from what I have seen. Now how many of those players are free-to-15 like me vs paying users? No idea.

It would be interesting to see those numbers, but logic says that the longer they wait to pull the F2P switch, the more people lose interest all together. I mean, every business class I ever attended, every marketing meeting I have ever attended...the bottom line was that you need to stay relevant so that if you make dramatic changes people give you a chance. Let yourself become irrelevant and people cease to care how good your changes are. Maybe that is changed a bit in the entertainment industry, as I said I am not a developer, but I would think it would be pretty much the same.

Waiting until Fall to make the switch, particularly with the holiday releases coming, seems bad in another way. Every single MMO I have played that switched to F2P....no matter how good/bad the result....went through some growing pains during that switch. If it needs a bunch of tweaking, the timing of the release isn't exactly going to make for very forgiving players. Waiting until the market gets competitive, school is back in session, the holidays are starting....it just seems like very poor planning all the way around.

I guess I just look at this whole release, from the very beginning, as poorly thought out and poorly executed. The game has strengths, I myself actually like it more then most people it seems. The problem, I believe, is similar to the one that Galaxies had. The developer/publisher is relying too much on the license and worrying too much about appealing to everyone rather then finding a specific target audience. I think they should have gotten good at something, then worried about getting better at other things, if you get my meaning. This game, from the beginning, did a whole lot of things, and all of them are at best "average". In today's market I just don't see that being profitable long term, and I definitely don't see it making for a good game.

This comment was edited on Sep 19, 2012, 17:00.

Jivaro wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 16:02:
I don't see why they are waiting so long to go fully F2P.

DC Universe implemented F2P as soon as they realized a monthly sub wasn't going to work. The game still runs, and is even generating some money. I think it is because they didn't wait until everyone quit and the player base was so small that you couldn't make money off the in-game store.

Seems to me that Bioware/EA is counting on people to want to come back and give them a second chance....and with all the competition out there, I am not really sure that is going to work. Would have been smarter to go F2P while you still had most of the players' attention. Particularly given that the biggest complaints about the game revolve around endgame and PVP content...which are the only things to keep you playing after you complete a the story line. Even if people come back, how do you sell them anything in the in-game store if they leave again as soon as they wrap up their storyline?

I don't know, I am not a developer and I have zero experience in managing a project like that....but it just seems like one bonehead short-sighted decision after another.

They actually have a pretty reasonable number of high pop servers from what I have seen. Now how many of those players are free-to-15 like me vs paying users? No idea.

Steele Johnson wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 13:25:

Not to mention the fact that most women hate Star Wars and sci-fi themed games.

Ignorant much?

I don't see why they are waiting so long to go fully F2P.

DC Universe implemented F2P as soon as they realized a monthly sub wasn't going to work. The game still runs, and is even generating some money. I think it is because they didn't wait until everyone quit and the player base was so small that you couldn't make money off the in-game store.

Seems to me that Bioware/EA is counting on people to want to come back and give them a second chance....and with all the competition out there, I am not really sure that is going to work. Would have been smarter to go F2P while you still had most of the players' attention. Particularly given that the biggest complaints about the game revolve around endgame and PVP content...which are the only things to keep you playing after you complete a the story line. Even if people come back, how do you sell them anything in the in-game store if they leave again as soon as they wrap up their storyline?

I don't know, I am not a developer and I have zero experience in managing a project like that....but it just seems like one bonehead short-sighted decision after another.

nin wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 14:43:

Prez wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 13:07:
I'd hate to have to be the guy who has to give these press releases and try to spin what can only be described as the spectacular drawn-out implosion of their 300 million dollar failure as a positive. "Oh yeah, server consolidation after going F2P a scant year after releasing with a resounding thud, baby! We totally ROCK!! High fives all around!!".

I'd hate to be the guy who got the TOR tattoo on his shoulder.

HAHA!

We might not be able to upgrade the weapons, but the new added tokens for achievements are just awesome and those do allow you to upgrade certain aspects of your weapons or your personal self. Love that they added this.

I agree, I think it's my favorite new feature.

nin wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 12:49:

Creston wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 11:35:
Everyone off the good ship TOR, because it's sinking fast!!

Creston

I will say, while playing BL2 last night, that I wish I could upgrade favorite weapons like I could in TOR.

That's like the only positive thing that pops into my head about TOR right now, but it is positive...

We might not be able to upgrade the weapons, but the new added tokens for achievements are just awesome and those do allow you to upgrade certain aspects of your weapons or your personal self. Love that they added this.

Does anyone know yet when this is going free to play? I’m pretty sure this is the first step consolidating users to going free. I’m just dreading that all of my chars now have some weird ass server name in front of all my char’s now. Usually you will only get a chance to rename them after the move has taken place. Not months later which has always bothered me that they don’t allow us to rename.

Prez wrote on Sep 19, 2012, 13:07:
I'd hate to have to be the guy who has to give these press releases and try to spin what can only be described as the spectacular drawn-out implosion of their 300 million dollar failure as a positive. "Oh yeah, server consolidation after going F2P a scant year after releasing with a resounding thud, baby! We totally ROCK!! High fives all around!!".

I'd hate to be the guy who got the TOR tattoo on his shoulder.